Automation as a genre has, over the last several years, tended more and more towards the "big open world with all the space" type of game. Sure, sometimes the space is semi-limited, like in the sadly-flawed Techtonica, but an aspect of automation used to be figuring out how to make a tiny little area contain all the bits and pieces needed for a specific output. Frequently with a few machines already in place just to make life difficult and to enforce a specific way of approaching the puzzle aspect of the layout. Even games like Kaizen have plenty of space if you don't mind doing terribly in the ranking, but sometimes you just have to build small.
The original Shapez was a fairly bland-looking but intricate automation game that spawned a puzzle-based DLC pack, and the plan was that Shapez 2 would continue on in that tradition. That idea grew into being a full-fledged spin-off game that was announced today, now revealed as Puzzlez: A Shapez Game, and it's pretty much exactly what you might picture from the name. You've got X amount of space to perform Y number of actions, and uh... good luck with that? Having way too many hours in Shapez 2 is bound to help quite a bit, but with multiple planes of automation running concurrently it can take a bit of thought to get the output right.
To clarify what Puzzlez will be, it's best to begin with an overview of Shapez 2. Shapez 2 is a game about creating automated systems that output specific shapes, created from tiles divided into four quadrants. While a basic circle is four quarter-circles on a single plane, you could also take that same circle, cut it into its individual pieces, color each quadrant differently, and then layer them one on top of the other if the request was for a tall garish quarter-circle stack. While the number of basic component-shapes was limited (circle, square, X, four-pointed star, scalloped-edge thingy, peg) the number of ways needed to put them together was dizzying, especially when taking into account the needed output could be four layers tall.
Puzzlez takes the massive factories you'd need to build in Shapez 2 and shrinks them down to size, taking the focus away from high-speed throughput and changing it to building the request within the level's pre-defined limits. Each of Puzzlez's seventy five levels has a goal you need to produce using the familiar machines of Shapez, which frequently run using input from multiple planes. A stacker, for example, doesn't flip one piece like a burger on top of another, but rather drops it down from above. This means you can have multiple processes running simultaneously in the same limited space, assuming the puzzle allows it. The rules are variable from one puzzle to the next, after all, so there's no promise that all options are always available.
In addition to the regular levels, Puzzlez: A Shapez Game will also come with an editor for users to create their own, and players will be able to upload their levels thanks to its community sharing features. The goal is to have a fully-featured game that grows with its players, starting off accessible with the earliest of the included puzzles and then seeing what kind of nightmare scenarios the users create. No matter how complicated things may get, though, Puzzlez always aims to be a chill experience, with no time limits or other stress-inducing elements, coupled with a warm, inviting art style and relaxing audio. A good puzzle is all about the pleasure of solving it, after all, and if that involves slicing a shape into pieces and burning the bits back together into a twisted mockery of its natural form, then so long as all the steps fit within the allotted space that's all the satisfaction one could hope for.
سەرچاوەی فەرمی بە زمانی ئینگلیزی: https://hardcoregamer.com/taking-automation-back-to-its-thinky-aspect-puzzlez-a-shapez-game-announced/
